The original concept I worked out in 2005 for Sunnyville was going to be quite different from the incarnation we all know and love today. The early incarnation of Sunnyville was going to be titled “Sunnyville 77”. The premise was essentially a combination of both Maple Town as well as the 1989 movie UHF with Weird Al Yankovic.
Above is a page from Sunnyville Stories #0, which shows an early design for Rusty’s father Al; early on in my design phases, he wore glasses. In fact, he was going to be a caricature of UHF’s star Weird Al Yankovic.
As for the series itself, it would have been different from the current form of Sunnyville. While there would be day-to-day interactions with the townspeople, the focus would have been on the independent television station, Channel 77. Rusty’s father Al was going to be in charge of the station. Rusty and his friend Sam (still a rabbit before I changed her to a cat) would help out Rusty’s father at the station. While they helped him to create original programming for the station, they’d have also acted as troubleshooters. Besides challenges in Rusty’s father running the television station, there was going to be a big city station executive looking to ruin Channel 77 and would have provided the chief antagonist for Rusty and Sam.
So why didn’t I go with this incarnation of Sunnyville? To be honest, I felt something just wasn’t clicking. I didn’t feel that the premise could work and it was going against what I wanted to do. I wanted to tell a simple story about a remote village. In this version, the hamlet of Sunnyville would have taken a back seat to the television station.
Channel 77 still exists though in this version of Sunnyville. It’s the local television station over in Solton and it will play a big role in Sunnyville #15.
Meanwhile, sign up for the Sunnyville Stories mailing list if you haven’t yet. Stop over to DriveThru Comics for digital copies of Sunnyville Stories. Copies of Sunnyville Stories Volume 1 are still for sale on Amazon, both in print and Kindle formats! While you’re there, be sure to pick up Sunnyville Stories Volume 2 and (if you love Gothic horror) Von Herling, Vampire Hunter! And now available is the latest installment of the saga, Sunnyville Stories Volume 3. Get them today!
Copies of all the above titles are available to the library trade via Brodart Company and to retailers from Ingram and Baker & Taylor (via BCH Distribution). Copies are also available direct from the publisher. For ordering information, contact maxwestart(at)gmail(dot)com or write to:
Different Mousetrap Press LLC, 1100 19th Avenue N, #108, Unit J, Fargo ND 58102-2269 USA
